Blocksort is a "Hello, world!" example that actually does something. It will sort blocks of text in a text file. See the usage text for more details. It is being released in conjunction with AutoGen as a detailed example of how to incorporate AutoOpts into your projects. Before you look at the example, you need to consider that there are three levels of integration. You can:

Rely on a pre-installed "libopts"
library for whereever it gets built. This can be accomplished either by
installing AutoGen in its entirety, or by building and installing
strictly the libopts package.

This example program tackles the last and most difficult of
these levels of integration.

Local Only Use
This is actually very simple example (see the man2html for a more complete example). All you need to do is add the output from the "autoopts-config" script to your CFLAGS and linker options, a la:

Depend on a pre-installation
AutoGen will install an autoconf M4 macro file named, "autoopts.m4".
Invoke the macro, "AG_PATH_AUTOOPTS" in your "configure.ac"
file. It will produce four substitution variables and two configure options:

AUTOGEN
This is the full path name of the autogen executable.

AUTOOPTS_CFLAGS
Add this to your CFLAGS makefile variable.

AUTOOPTS_LIBS
Add this to the link command.

AUTOGEN_TPLIB
The full path to the directory where the AutoGen template library
is installed.

The contents of this tarball is designed to be incorporated into
software packages that utilize the AutoOpts option automation package
and are intended to be installed on systems that may not have libopts
installed. It is redistributable under the terms of either the LGPL
(see COPYING.lgpl) or under the terms of the advertising clause free BSD
license (see COPYING.mbsd).
Usage Instructions for autoconf/automake/libtoolized projects:
1. Install the unrolled tarball into your package source tree,
copying ``libopts.m4'' to your autoconf macro directory.
In your bootstrap (pre-configure) script, you can do this:
rm -rf libopts libopts-*
gunzip -c `autoopts-config libsrc` | tar -xvf -
mv -f libopts-*.*.* libopts
cp -fp libopts/m4/*.m4 m4/.
I tend to put my configure auxiliary files in "m4".
Whatever directory you choose, if it is not ".", then
be sure to tell autoconf about it with:
AC_CONFIG_AUX_DIR(m4)
This is one macro where you *MUST* remember to *NOT* quote
the argument. If you do, automake will get lost.
2. Add an invocation of either LIBOPTS_CHECK or LIBOPTS_CHECK_NOBUILD
to your configure.ac file. See LIBOPTS_CHECK: below for details.
3. Add the following to your top level ``Makefile.am'' file:
if NEED_LIBOPTS
SUBDIRS += $(LIBOPTS_DIR)
endif
where ``<...>'' can be whatever other files or directories you may
need. The SUBDIRS must be properly ordered. *PLEASE NOTE* it is
crucial that the SUBDIRS be set under the control of an automake
conditional. To work correctly, automake has to know the range of
possible values of SUBDIRS. It's a magical name with magical
properties. ``NEED_LIBOPTS'' will be correctly set by the
``LIBOPTS_CHECK'' macro, above.
4. Add ``$(LIBOPTS_CFLAGS)'' to relevant compiler flags and
``$(LIBOPTS_LDADD)'' to relevant link options whereever
you need them in your build tree.
5. Make sure your object files explicitly depend upon the
generated options header file. e.g.:
$(prog_OBJECTS) : prog-opts.h
prog-opts.h : prog-opts.c
prog-opts.c : prog-opts.def
autogen prog-opts.def
6. *OPTIONAL* --
If you are creating man pages and texi documentation from
the program options, you will need these rules somewhere, too:
man_MANS = prog.1
prog.1 : prog-opts.def
autogen -Tagman-cmd.tpl -bprog prog-opts.def
invoke-prog.texi : prog-opts.def
autogen -Tagtexi-cmd.tpl prog-opts.def
If your package does not utilize the auto* tools, then you
will need to hand craft the rules for building the library.
LIBOPTS_CHECK:
The arguments to both macro are a relative path to the directory with
the libopts source code. It is optional and defaults to "libopts".
These macros work as follows:
1. LIBOPTS_CHECK([libopts/rel/path/optional])
Adds two command-line options to the generated configure script,
--enable-local-libopts and --disable-libopts-install. AC_SUBST's
LIBOPTS_CFLAGS, LIBOPTS_LDADD, and LIBOPTS_DIR for use in
Makefile.am files. Adds Automake conditional NEED_LIBOPTS which
will be true when the local copy of libopts should be built. Uses
AC_CONFIG_FILES([$libopts-dir/Makefile]) to cause the local libopts
into the package build. If the optional relative path to libopts is
not provided, it defaults to simply "libopts".
2. LIBOPTS_CHECK_NOBUILD([libopts/rel/path/optional])
This variant of LIBOPTS_CHECK is useful when multiple configure.ac
files in a package make use of a single libopts tearoff. In that
case, only one of the configure.ac files should build libopts and
others should simply use it. Consider this package arrangment:
all-tools/
configure.ac
common-tools/
configure.ac
libopts/
The parent package all-tools contains a subpackage common-tools
which can be torn off and used independently. Programs configured
by both configure.ac files link against the common-tools/libopts
tearoff, when not using the system's libopts. The top-level
configure.ac uses LIBOPTS_CHECK_NOBUILD([common-tools/libopts]),
while common-tools/configure.ac uses LIBOPTS_CHECK. The difference
is LIBOPTS_CHECK_NOBUILD will never build the libopts tearoff,
leaving that to the subpackage configure.ac's LIBOPTS_CHECK.
Specifically, LIBOPTS_CHECK_NOBUILD always results in the
NEED_LIBOPTS Automake conditional being false, and does not invoke
AC_CONFIG_FILES(path-to-libopts/Makefile).
LICENSING:
This material is Copyright (C) 1992-2014 by Bruce Korb. You are
licensed to use this under the terms of either the GNU Lesser General
Public License (see: COPYING.lgpl), or, at your option, the modified
Berkeley Software Distribution License (see: COPYING.mbsd). Both of
these files should be included with this tarball.

blocksort (MyTools) - Sort Blocks of Text - Ver. 1.2
Usage: blocksort { <option-name>[{=| }<val>] }...
Arg Option-Name Req? Description
Mbr syntax opt EXTENDED, ICASE or NEWLINE (see regcomp(3))
- is a set membership option
no cook opt process escaped characters
- disabled as '--no-cook'
- may appear up to 4 times
Str pattern YES File Segmentation Pattern
Str key opt Sort Key Finding Pattern
Str date-key opt Date Format Sort Key
- an alternate for 'key'
no invert opt Reverse the sort order
Str trailer opt Trailer Finding Pattern
Str start opt Starting Point Pattern
Str input opt Input File
- default option for unnamed options
Str output opt Output File
Num spacing opt blank line count between sections
no verbose opt Display extra information
opt version opt output version information and exit
no help opt display extended usage information and exit
--- help display extended usage information and exit
All arguments are named options.
Sort blocks of a text file denoted by an extended regular expression.
The valid "syntax" option keywords are:
extended icase newline
or an integer mask with any of the lower 3 bits set
or you may use a numeric representation. Preceding these with a '!'
will clear the bits, specifying 'none' will clear all bits, and 'all'
will set them all. Multiple entries may be passed as an option
argument list.
Given a search pattern, this program will segment a file on the start of
every line that matches a pattern. Each block of text is then
lexicographically sorted and reassembled into the output. Any text found
before the first match will be left in place. If "KEY" or "DATE_KEY" is
supplied, the sort is based on the matching text (or date). If that
expression contains subexpressions, then the comparison(s) will be against
those subexpressions only. If "KEY" is not found in a block, the sort key
becomes the empty string. The "Trailer" pattern can be used to keep a
block of text at the end of the file. The "start" option will cause the
first block to be found after that regular expression.
Please send bug reports to: <bkorb@gnu.org>
exit 0